Berwin Leighton Paisner LLP

Overview:

Berwin Leighton Paisner LLP’s achievements for clients are made possible by brilliant people. Prized for their legal talent and commercial focus, BLP lawyers are renowned for being personally committed to their client’s success.BLP is a leading international law firm with a reputation for innovation in legal services. With offices in Abu Dhabi, Berlin, Brussels, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London, Moscow, Paris and Singapore, the firm’s international footprint was extended further with openings in Dubai, 2012 and Beijing, 2013, helping us meet the needs of clients in an increasingly internationalised market.

The firm’s expertise covers all aspects of commercial law; competition, EU and trade; construction, engineering and procurement; corporate finance; dispute resolution; employment, pensions and incentives; finance; intellectual property; private client; real estate; regulatory and compliance; restructuring and insolvency; and tax.

The firm: One of the fastest growing top 20 UK law firms in recent years, BLP continues to recruit and promote leading individuals as part of an ambitious programme to employ top-ranked legal experts globally. Its real estate capabilities are amongst the most highly regarded in the UK, it has one of the largest and broadest tax teams in the City, its real estate finance practice has worked on some of the biggest securitisations deals of the past number of years, and the firm is currently ranked by the Financial Times as one of Europe’s top ten legal innovators.

BLP is renowned for responding creatively to the challenges clients face, for example, Lawyers On Demand provides a high-quality pool of over 120 flexible, freelance lawyers, offered to clients at low cost, as and when needed, and we have recently created ‘Integrated Dispute Resolution’, a five-pronged model where clients are able to utilise BLP’s capabilities from instruction to trial. Through an innovative legal outsourcing arrangement the firm is also delivering a truly client-centric service to Thames Water – managing their legal needs under a long-term, fixed-price deal. Further, the firm recently launched an Integrated Client Service Model, which consists of: Legal Process Improvement (LPI); LOD virtual transaction teams; third parties sourcing; and BLP Manchester – a legal services delivery team.

As well as its own offices of which there are 11 in total, BLP has strong relationships with a non-exclusive panel of the leading independent local law firms around the world. Via its preferred firm network, the firm has access to more than three times as many tier-one ranked legal practices in Asia and Europe than any ‘global’ law firm. Across Europe, these relationships enable BLP to call upon 230 tier-one ranked practices, meaning the firm can deliver the highest quality local advice in a flexible, seamless way that reflects the circumstances of each jurisdiction and the requirements of each matter. As a result, BLP successfully supports clients across 130 different jurisdictions, and was short-listed for a Managing Partners Forum Award for Best International Collaboration across Frontiers in 2012 and Best Managed International Firm in 2013.

Types of work undertaken: BLP lawyers are ranked in almost 70 areas of legal expertise and have extensive experience across numerous industry sectors. Its industry experience includes: energy and natural resources; financial institutions; healthcare; infrastructure; hotels, sport and leisure; outsourcing and business services; public sector and not-for-profit; real estate; retail; security, defence and aerospace; and transport.

The firm embraces diversity and is committed to social responsibility, with 33% of BLP employees taking part in corporate responsibility activities during working hours last year – more than twice the London Benchmarking Group member average. In 2012 the firm was listed in The Times report – Top 50 ‘Employers for Women’, and its trainee retention rate for Spring 2014 was 89%.

Areas of law: